be careful of contagion, warn professionals

Building, housing and construction professionals are sounding the alarm: their sector is in great pain and, according to them, this risks seizing up the entire economy.

The years of euphoria in real estate are over. HASWith inflation and interest rates soaring, households are having difficulty accessing credit. According to Fnaim, the national real estate federation, the French have lost 25% of their purchasing capacity in just two years.

There is also a tightening of standards and obligations for owners. For example, the energy diagnosis, which prevents renting according to certain criteria, encourages sales of thermal strainers. These elements destabilize the sector and many real estate programs and constructions collapse. The corollary is the drop in activity of real estate agents, notaries, brokers, building contractors, developers, etc. In one year, almost a thousand real estate agencies have closed and major developers are downsizing.

Real estate, a crisis factor

This real estate crisis could lead to a more general crisis. This sector can really slow down the economy and be a crisis accelerator. In fact, the decline in housing causes a reduction in geographic mobility. Moving, changing regions, to take a job elsewhere becomes very complicated and reduces the chances of reducing unemployment. The situation also has an impact on the birth rate. A young couple who can’t find an apartment put off having a baby. The same goes for a family that wants to grow. Thus, if becoming an owner becomes an unattainable horizon, particularly for the middle classes, confidence in the future is affected and this fuels anger. So housing is a very important point, a lever in the economy.

We are waiting for the government to take stock of the issue, but for the moment, it still does not have a Minister of Housing. For professionals, this is a very bad sign. Another bad move, according to them, is the elimination of the Pinel tax loophole, which encourages wealthy households to invest in rental housing to lower their taxes. This system, which costs the State more than 1 billion euros per year, must disappear at the end of 2024. For the government, it is a question of saving money. But beyond these movements, some politicians believe that the State has helped this sector too much and that what is happening is just a rebalancing, a normalization in short. Everyone defends their parish. And it’s hardly a dialogue of the deaf. We will see what Gabriel Attal will say, he obviously plans to talk about it in his general policy speech on Tuesday January 30.